“Fools rush in where angels fear to tread” could well apply to the team behind the formation of Dads4Kids. Our dream was simply to encourage, resource and inspire dads to be the best fathers in the world for their children. Such projects are easier said than done, but nothing could have prepared us for the hostility to all things ‘father. Our first TV adverts for Father’s Day 2002 were threatened with ...

  Sometimes, when you read a book, it is just a story. Other times the story reaches out and grabs you with both hands and touches your heart. That’s what the book ‘Twice Adopted’ by Michael Reagan © 2004, Broadman & Holman, Nashville USA, did to me when I read it. Mike is the adopted eldest son of Ronald Reagan, former President of the United States of America. He is also ...

We live in an age of astonishing scientific and technological development that has given human beings an amazing number of ways to communicate. However, it could be argued that real communication is taking place less and less. Concurrently, we are facing an unprecedented explosion of knowledge, but it could be argued that we now know less than we ever have, because we are drowning in a sea of information. Information overload, ...

We are all living letters to our children, and our children’s children. This really came through to me at a Fatherhood Success Seminar I recently conducted in Coffs Harbour, NSW. One of the dads at the seminar shared with the group about the 250 letters that his father had written to his mother and brothers and sisters when he was just a baby during the Second World War. Bill’s father was ...

Some parents bring up their children on thunder and lightning, but thunder and lightning never made anything grow. As a dad with strong opinions about injustice and a passion for the truth, I can easily fall into this trap myself. No doubt at times I have. Thankfully my children have forgiven me for my occasional rants. This week, you will have to as well. The topic is ‘Working Together for Men ...

Tarzan’s Grip or Loctite is the best way to glue materials together. Both of these adhesives are commonly called ‘superglues’. But what is the best way to glue families together? Marriage is the superglue that bonds families together like no other adhesive! Marriage protects our children. Marriage guarantees our children’s future. Marriage protects our finances and our children’s finances. Marriage protects men and marriage protects women. Best of all, marriage protects ...

Well I got my card in the mail today, and I don’t mean a Father’s Day card. I am now, according to the NSW Government ‘a senior’. Because so much of our work is voluntary my wife put me in for a seniors card. It gives me some discounts for train travel and a few other privileges but I must admit I preferred my non-senior status, but at 60 my wife ...

You as a father have a lot of reasons to be happy. Each of your children gives you well over a million reasons. Add your wife and family as a total unit and you now have well over a billion reasons to be happy. In the light of all this, being happy on Father’s Day should come easy to you. Could it get any better? We know that we all have ...

Great news! This Thursday 4 September, Aaron Dickson will be coming to Australia as a guest of Dads4Kids to help and inspire Aussie dads. This tour will be called ‘Love Your Children’ Tour (code for fatherhood explosion) – Australia, look out!! We already have Aaron booked in at Sunrise Channel 7 for 7.45am on Friday 5 September, prime time in TV land. Later that morning he will also be on Channel ...

  If watching this YouTube video doesn’t touch your heart nothing will. I ignored the tear jerker alert posted below the video, much to my discomfort. By the end of the video I was bawling like a baby. With six million views and climbing it seems I am not alone. There is something extraordinarily inspirational about a truck driving dad who obviously can’t dance, endeavouring to dance with his beautiful 12 ...

Sometimes, for me, books become my best friends.  I am a very inquisitive soul at the best of times.  I love reading and I also strongly identify with Scrooge McDuck and all his Scottish ancestry.  Maybe it’s because I can still remember my Scottish grandmother saying things like, “Waste not, want not”, or “Look after the pennies and the pounds will look after themselves.”  For all those Generation X’s, my grandmother ...

‘Your Wife is Beautiful’ is the title for this week’s newsletter, I proudly announced to my wife. “Why not call it ‘Beauty is in the Eye of the Beholder’? or ‘You are Beautiful’?” my wife inquired. She was trying to be inclusive of those readers who are not married to the mother of their children. “No”, I said, “I want men to marry the woman they love, the mother of their ...

Sociologist David Papenoe said that no civilisation ever survived after its family life deteriorated. But if you don’t believe him, listen to GK Chesterton, “This triangle of truisms, of father, mother and child, cannot be destroyed; it can only destroy those civilisations which disregard it.” If three words could ever sum up the work of Dads4Kids it would be ‘father, mother, child’. These three words are the foundation for everything we know. ...

I am getting older, so my testosterone is dropping, but when I see a naked woman, it is hard not to look twice. The trouble is that these days, naked women are everywhere and they always seem to be looking straight back at me. When I go to the newsagents to buy my daily copy of the Australian, the naked women on the news stand are always looking at me.   When ...

The Dads4Kids Fatherhood Foundation will be running ten week fathering courses called, ‘Good to Great’ in the later part of this year. ‘Good to Great’ is not a pushover fathering course but a course that is highly interactive and brings real challenge to any aspiring father who wants to go to a much higher level of excellence in his fathering. ‘Good to Great’ is inspired by the SAS, the elite of ...

Recently the Weekend Australian Magazine did a story on Fred Hollow’s daughters and their visit to Nepal where their renowned father did much of his famous ophthalmology work amongst the poor. Connecting it to Dad has been a lifelong challenge for the Hollows twins, the youngest of the five children of Fred and Gabi Hollows. They were conceived on Anzac Day 1989, when Hollows already knew he was dying from the ...

Dads4Kids is going through a period of change. We need to connect more with you, our readers. We need to consider what we have achieved, who we are doing it for and what we might do better. Improvement is always possible and none of us can ever say that we’ve got it all together. Sometime ago a good friend of mine, Darryl Mills, sent me this story about a young girl ...

Fatheroos and Socceroos – we have a lot in common. We both make mistakes. We have our wins and we have our losses. We need encouragement. We need our fans. We need our coaches and we need to work hard at training to get better. The similarities between the challenges of playing for the Socceroos and being a father are striking to say the least. As Samuel Goldwyn famously said, “The ...

I am a sook. Yes, it is now out in the open. Everyone knows now! I rarely go a week without crying. Tears are an occupational health hazard if your mission is to turn the tide of fatherlessness. I am crying for others or crying for myself or maybe a bit of both. Sometimes it is hard to know. Did I say that tears are good for your health? Well, it ...

Having a father is a human right. ‘Kids need a Mum & Dad’. To you and I this is obviously unquestionable. The Universal Declaration for Human Rights was ratified by the United Nations after World War II on 10 December 1948. It says in the preamble: “Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, ...